


if convenient, come at once

by QLaLa



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Anal Sex, Christmas, First Time, Fix-It, Fluff, Getting Together, Holidays, Ice Skating, Kissing, M/M, Oral Sex, Pining, Rimming, Smut, by all parties involved, egregious misuse of time travel technology
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-26
Updated: 2019-12-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:34:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21929779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QLaLa/pseuds/QLaLa
Summary: On Christmas Eve, a battered antique postcard arrived in Barry’s mailbox. The message on the back was hastily scrawled, at odds with the festive ice skating illustration on the front. Smudged charcoal spelled out a pair of unfamiliar coordinates, a message calling in an unspecified favor, and a time: just before midnight, December 24, 1863.Beneath that was a fingerprint, as familiar to Barry as the dead man it belonged to.
Relationships: Barry Allen/Leonard Snart
Comments: 24
Kudos: 245





	if convenient, come at once

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to my beta, @enemiestolovers!
> 
> Title comes from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes: “If convenient, come at once. If inconvenient, come all the same.”

The fingerprint on the postcard belonged to Leonard Snart. 

Barry didn’t need to run the print to know that much. He had spent more time studying Snart’s files than any other criminal in his career; his left thumbprint, with the small curved scar on its right edge, was more familiar to Barry than his own. 

He couldn’t have run it through the system even if he wanted to, of course, for the simple reason that Leonard Snart was supposed to be dead. 

For over two years, Barry had dealt with his friends and family tiptoeing around the subject. It had been impossible not to notice—Iris’s carefully chosen words, Caitlin’s quiet suggestion about a grief counselor, the way Cisco left the cold gun prototype on its shelf when they all knew it was safer to have it destroyed. 

Two years. It should have been enough time, if Barry had been brave enough to face the tangled mess of emotions Leonard’s death left in its wake. But he hadn’t been. The feelings had stayed buried, and he hadn’t been able to stop himself from lashing out, raw and defensive, whenever his friends tried to check in with him. It had been one death too many, the list growing until Barry had felt only a hollow numbness where there had once been grief and anger. 

And then, six months ago, a message from Sara Lance had arrived in the middle of the night at STAR Labs. It had seemed too good to be true. Barry had played it three times, four times, five, the light from the screen flickering over his face in the dark, before the words finally sunk in. He couldn’t believe it could be that easy, that the universe could just wave its hand and erase a name from the list of the dead.

Sara had been certain, though. They’d quizzed his memory vigorously, she’d said, and Gideon had run tests until Leonard had pulled off the sensors and threatened to ice the next person who touched him.

“So definitely our Leonard,” Sara had concluded with a wry smile. Barry hadn’t even known he was crying until he felt the tears hit his cheeks.

In the six months that followed, Barry had checked the scanners each morning as soon as he arrived at STAR Labs, waiting for any sign that the Waverider was coming back to Central City. Barry had thought for sure that Leonard would come back, at least to see his sister, at least to rub his freshly-minted hero card in Team Flash’s face. But no sign had ever come; no visit, not even another message. 

Until now, at least. 

Five minutes ago, a postman had knocked on Barry's door, and presented him with a special delivery he’d had to sign for while keeping one eye on the kitchen timer. When he took the envelope inside, he found it covered in a dozen address redirects, a UK customs label, and a specific deliver-on date. 

Inside was a single, antique postcard. There was a festive ice-skating scene drawn on the front, and the address of one of his old apartments was written on the back. Beside that, in smudged charcoal, someone had scrawled a pair of coordinates, a message calling in some unspecified favor, and a time: just before midnight, December 24, 1843. 

And beneath that, the fingerprint. Leonard Snart’s fingerprint. 

He was already late for dinner. Joe always cooked a huge meal on Christmas Eve, a tradition left over from years long past, when he would try to stuff Barry and Iris into a stupor to get them to sleep despite their excitement for Santa’s arriva. It was a more relaxed affair now, with a few years before the whole tradition would have to start back up again with Iris and Wally’s new step-sister. But it was still an important night, and Joe had entrusted him with dessert for the first time, and he didn’t want to mess it up. 

But, the thing was. 

He turned the postcard over, fingers worrying the card’s battered edges as he gazed at the tiny skating figures without seeing them. The thing was, he could make it. That was the one of the few good parts of time travel: even if whatever the Legends were calling him in on took all night, he could time it to arrive back only seconds after he left. 

He looked at the thumbprint again, then back at the timer for the cookies.

Two minutes left. 

Plenty of time. 

* * *

Barry didn’t recognize the city he came to a halt in, half-obscured as it was by a dense, hovering fog. There was a tall gothic church rising out of the shadows on one end of the wide public square, with soot clinging to its bricks and stained glass windows. The air was heavy with the scent of horses and woodsmoke, and the stars above him were blotted out by low, grey clouds.

“Well, well, well.”

The voice stopped Barry cold.

“If it isn’t the ghost of Christmas yet to come. Stop to run the fingerprint?”

Barry had met countless of Leonard’s doppelgangers since his death, each one more painful than the last. And with each one, Barry had found himself meeting their gaze too often, hoping for any sign of recognition beyond whatever introductions had just been made. 

Looking now at the man standing beneath the oily street lamp, top hat tilted rakishly over one eye, it was obvious what a mistake all those other times had been. Leonard’s eyes met his and time stopped. The familiarity was unmistakable. The memory of every fight and conversation they’d ever had lived in that pale blue gaze—every fleeting touch, every broken bone. 

Barry took an involuntary step toward him.

“Look alive, Flash!”

Barry didn’t have time to register the familiar voice of Mick Rory, tearing himself from Leonard’s gaze and spinning to look behind him. 

Mick’s warning was all that saved him from being bowled over by something enormous and antlered. Barry pulled for the speed force on instinct, no time for a proper dodge, and threw himself bodily out of the creature’s path.

He landed hard on the cobblestones and the beast charged past him, apparently more intent on escaping the lasso in Mick’s hands than goring anyone. 

Leonard stepped calmly to the side and let the animal careen past as well, then turned back to them. He was wearing a well-fitting three-piece suit and leather gloves, and he looked unfairly at home in the nineteenth-century disguise. 

“Welcome to London,” he said. He swept the hat off his head, then tipped Barry a smirk. “Hope you brought your hunting license.” 

“We’re not killing the reindeer!”

The annoyed shout came from Sara Lance, whom Barry found, after a quick glance around, about a dozen yards to his left. She was holding another animal down by the antlers, looking annoyed but unphased as the reindeer snorted steam and rolled its wild eyes at her. Beside her, Ray was making quick work of tying its hooves together. 

They were both dressed similarly to Leonard, minus two top hats, and they did a double-take when they saw him. 

“Barry?” Sara asked. “Don’t tell me there’s another crisis again already. Didn’t we already have one this year?” 

Barry shook his head as he pushed himself back to his feet, wincing at the residual sting in his knees. 

“I thought you called me,” he said. 

Ray and Sara exchanged a glance, then both looked at Leonard. 

“Figured we could fight fire with fire,” Leonard said. “Or in this case,”—he tilted his head, indicating Barry—”speed with speedsters. No offense, Mick.” 

Mick grunted in response, attention elsewhere, then threw his lasso nearly straight in the air. A horrible braying followed, and Mick whooped. “Got one! Finish that knot and get over here, Boy Scout!” 

Barry let his gaze follow the path of the rope up, and he nearly sat back down in surprise. “They fly,” he said weakly.

Leonard hummed in agreement, just behind him.

Barry jumped; he hadn’t heard him approach. 

“Team’s supposed to be escorting some kind of wish-granting creature,” Leonard said. When Barry glanced at him in confusion, he added, “I’m fuzzy on the details myself. Mick tried reading it a bedtime story. Turns out it was a little too taken with…” He twirled his fingers impatiently until he found the phrase he was looking for. “‘Twas the night before Christmas.’” 

He cut an unimpressed look at the reindeer that Mick was trying to wrangle out of the sky. 

“It’s a classic!” Mick bellowed. His tone told Barry that he was arriving late to the argument.

“So’s the story of Hanukkah,” Leonard shot back. “Guess which one doesn’t involve flying quadrupeds.” 

“Can we _please_ table this?” Sara shouted at them. And then, in a considerably more friendly tone: “Barry, since you’re already here—?” 

Barry gave up on fighting back the smile pulling up the corner of his lips and nodded in her direction. “Just tell me what to do.”

What followed was one of the most ridiculous hours of Barry’s life. The fog gave him enough cover to zip after the animals (which, frankly, seemed more confused by their ability to fly than the humans chasing them) without fear of any witnesses, and it became almost fun after a while. 

It even went fairly well—for the first seven deer. 

The last one was faster than the rest. It was the one that had nearly mowed Barry down on arrival, and he was increasingly sure that it had a vendetta against him, specifically. There was an intelligent gleam in its eyes, and it seemed to have learned from the tactics the Legends had used to catch its seven companions. When Barry finally, after a chase that nearly ended with him in the Thames, managed to grab hold of the thick fur on the back of neck, the reindeer kicked off the ground, then bucked off him from thirty feet in the air.

He hit the ground hard. 

A Legend he didn’t know arrived a moment later, carrying a tranquilizer synthesized by Gideon, and brought the last reindeer down with a crash. When she turned to Barry, she grimaced as she looked at his left foot, then said, by way of introduction, “Well, that looks broken.” 

“Feels broken, too,” Barry said. He tried to flex his toes and had to bite his tongue to keep from screaming. When the Legend helped him back to standing, he shifted his weight to stay balanced on his right foot. 

“I’m Charlie, by the way,” she said. “Did Snart call you?” 

Barry, eyes still watering, was saved from answering by Mick’s sudden appearance by his side. 

“Up we go, Red,” he said, and reached toward him. 

Barry skittered backwards without thinking, old instincts taking over when he realized Mick was trying to grab him, and he made it two steps at Flash speed before the pain in his foot sent him crashing to the cobblestones again.

“He’s actually very good at carrying people,” Charlie said. “Don’t worry. We’re not very far, anyway.” 

When Mick ambled over to him and held out a hand, Barry hesitated for a moment, then pushed aside his old apprehensions and let him haul him up. 

“Not far from what?” Barry asked. 

“We draw too much attention getting on and off the Waverider in a city like London,” Sara said, wiping her gloves on her trousers as she approached them. “We’re stationed up at an inn around the corner. Margaret’ll take care of your foot. Mick, Leonard.” She jerked her chin, indicating. “Get him there safely. The rest of us will handle cleanup. Charlie, is the little demon still in lockup?”

“Safe and secure, Captain.”

“Great. And someone get Barry a coat before he freezes.” She glanced at the Flash suit, then added, “Or gets arrested. Or both.” 

Barry was, now that Sara mentioned it, beginning to shiver. He hadn’t noticed the temperature dropping while he was running, but the chill was creeping under the edges of his gloves and boots, and he knew from experience that his healing factor became sluggish in the cold. 

Leonard drifted over to them again, and Barry was surprised when he shrugged out of the heavy wool coat he was wearing. He shook it out, then held it up for Barry to slip his arms inside.

Barry shivered at the warmth clinging to the silk lining. He could smell the clean metallic burn of the cold gun on the sleeves, as well as a scent of strong coffee and tobacco that he suspected belonged to whatever inn the Legends were staying at. Underneath that, and far more distracting, was the trace of subtle, spiced cologne that lingered on the inside of the coat’s collar. He ducked his head into the collar for a better sniff when Mick pulled his arm over his shoulder again, and kept his nose buried there as Mick half-dragged, half-limped him back to the inn. 

A glance over his shoulder showed Leonard following a few steps behind, a dangerous lilt to his walk with one hand resting on the cold gun in its holster on his thigh.

When they arrived outside a small, shuttered inn, Mick unceremoniously dumped him against Leonard’s side. Leonard was braced for it, catching him under the arms before he could tip over, but Barry lost his breath as completely as when he’d fallen thirty feet. He was pressed shoulder to hip against Leonard’s side, and he couldn’t help but think that it was the most physical contact they’d ever had. It seemed unfair, after years of absence, for Leonard to suddenly be so _present,_ so absolutely solid and warm against his front. He could smell the cologne stronger this close, that same warm spice whose familiarity evaded him no matter how he tried to pin it down. 

He realized, belatedly, that he was staring at Leonard’s neck, where he suspected he’d put the cologne, and pulled his gaze away hastily. 

Fortunately for him, Leonard was too busy shooting Mick an odd glare to notice. Mick grinned back, quick and sharp, and Leonard scowled before pulling Barry’s arm across his shoulders to bear more of his weight. 

Mick knocked on the door. 

It swung open before he’d even lifted his hand from the scarred oak, and Barry found himself staring down the barrel of an antique revolver. It was polished to a gleam, and judging from the two-handed grip its owner had on it, almost certainly loaded. 

He started to pull the moment to a stop, speed force flickering to life under his skin, but he stopped short when he felt Leonard’s hand squeeze his wrist in brief warning. More startled by the feeling of the soft leather against his skin than anything else, he let his powers recede, and shifted his focus to the stern older woman holding the gun.

Her hair was tied back with a faded woolen scarf, and her expression melted into exasperated fondness when she spotted Mick next to Barry.

“Mr. Rory!” she said, voice warm and hearty with a strong local accent. “Nearly gave me a heart attack. Ruffians are out tonight, and not your merry band.” She dropped the gun into the pocket of her apron and it dislodged a small cloud of flour. Then she looked at Barry, tilted awkwardly against Leonard’s side and trying to ignore the easy way Leonard’s fingers encircled his wrist, and said, “Have you lot been fighting again?” 

“He fell off a horse,” Mick said, and the woman swatted him on the chest with the back of her hand as he led the way into the inn. 

Barry couldn’t help another shiver at the temperature difference from outdoors, a wave of warmth rolling over them as soon as they stepped across the threshold. Wood fires crackled in the mantles along two walls, while fragrant pine rushes creaked underfoot and insulated the floor against the cold. Barry was surprised to see it was empty inside, despite a polished bar, as well as several large tables crowded with candlesticks and garlands. The scents of honey and roasting food were heavy in the air, as well as the earlier traces of tobacco and coffee he had caught on Leonard’s coat. 

“Ought to leave the poor beasts alone,” Margaret was saying, when Barry tuned back in. “Riding in this weather, imagine it. Nothing crooked, I hope? I don’t want to hear you’ve been out stealing the mounts out from under Scotland Yard again.”

Someone caught the door as it closed behind them, and then Sara was giving Margaret a wink and leading the rest of the Legends into the inn. Barry didn’t ask how they’d managed to “clean up” eight reindeer so quickly.

“Margaret was kind enough to let us all her rooms,” Sara explained, noticing his apprehension as the Legends fanned out across the room with various technological weapons exposed. “We have our privacy.”

“A good guest is worth her weight in gold,” Margaret said. 

“Literally,” Ray said. He looked a bit troubled. “We had some gold bars from, uh, other trips. I’m still not sure if we should be adding so much currency to the local economy—” 

“We needed a place to lay low,” Sara said, with a firm authority that Barry couldn’t help but envy.

“We needed a place where the unholy trinity wouldn’t start a bar fight and get us thrown out before the rest of us could sleep,” Ray disagreed.

“Hey,” Sara said. “We win bar fights.” She lifted a glass of beer—Barry was baffled by how she had gotten one so quickly—in Mick’s direction, then Leonard’s. 

“I’ll drink to that,” Mick said, and Leonard inclined his head with a smirk. 

Barry looked sideways at Leonard, found his face much too close, and had to avert his eyes when he asked, voice low, “Resorting to bar fights now? That’s some pretty low-level villainy, even for you.”

“Watch what you’re calling villainy,” Leonard said. 

The quiet curl of his voice made Barry regret speaking, and he swallowed hard and touched his broken foot lightly to the ground to distract himself with the pain. 

“We prefer ‘team bonding,’” Leonard said. “Sure you should be on that foot?” 

Barry could feel a blush climbing the back of his neck, and he flicked Leonard a brief glare.

“Suit yourself,” Leonard said. 

He helped him toward the nearest table anyway, Barry keeping his eyes fixed on the far wall as he tried to bear the indignity of hopping the short distance on one foot.

Margaret swept over to intercept them before they made it across the room. “Don’t you glare at me, young man,” she said, evidently to Leonard. Then she looked Barry up and down and wiped her hands on the floured apron. “Alright then,” she said. “Off with your clothes.” 

“Off with my—sorry, what?” 

“A fall from a horse is nothing to joke about,” she said. “Let me see your leg. And your ribs as well. Don’t be shy, boy, I raised four sons—”

“And all of them officers in the King’s Navy now,” Charlie and Sara chorused. 

“Uh, it’s just my foot, really,” Barry stammered. He was intensely aware of where Leonard’s hand was pressed against his side, and wondered if he could feel his heart beating. “And it’ll be fine, thank you. Just a sprain.”

Margaret cast a scowl at Sara. “Another American? Is your entire country going to be staying in my inn tonight?” 

Sara smiled back at her, all charm as she spread her arms and shrugged. 

Leonard maneuvered him past the stand-off, and Barry gave him a grateful look as he lowered him into a chair. He paused to unholster the cold gun, then dropped it onto the table and slid into the chair across from him. He took off his hat next. The early streaks of grey in his hair were more prominent than when Barry had seen him last, and it was with something close to despair that he realized it only made him look more striking. 

With the weight off of his broken foot, however, the rich smell of cooking food began to register under the haze of Barry’s pain. He sniffed hopefully, distracted for a moment from his cataloguing of Leonard’s appearance. 

“What?” he asked, seeing Leonard’s unimpressed expression. “I didn’t have dinner.” 

A young girl appeared from the kitchens with an enormous tray of biscuits, and Barry thanked her, then he took one from the plate before she could finish placing it on the table. 

“And, you know what,” he said, still to Leonard, “I’d like to see you heal a broken foot in one hour on an empty stomach.”

Leonard’s eyes glittered with interest at that. It was the same fascination with his powers that Barry had seen so many times, a distinctly covetous gleam in his eyes as his gaze swept over him, calculating and intent. 

Barry forced himself not to fidget under Leonard’s gaze. He knew that Leonard kept a dozen or more major heists tucked in his back pocket, waiting for the day that he could either convince or blackmail him into helping with a robbery. He was probably running through a list of appropriate targets in London as they spoke.

Still, the weight of Leonard’s full attention on him never failed to leave Barry a little flustered. When he realized he was crumbling the biscuit nervously under his hands, he forced himself to pop the last bite in his mouth instead, then sucked a smudge of butter off the tip of his index finger. 

He stole a sideways glance at Leonard and regretted it at once. Leonard’s gaze, still dark with interest, had settled on the finger between his lips. Barry froze, and Leonard took his time meeting his eye with a too-knowing smirk. 

Then someone pulled out the chair beside Barry with a pointed clatter, and Barry jumped guiltily and dropped his hand onto the table at Flash speed.

Ray cleared his throat for good measure as he sat down next to him, and didn’t quite meet his eye when he asked, “Would you mind passing me the biscuits, Barry?” 

Barry all but shoved the plate into his hands, willing away the blush he could feel scorching the back of his neck. He tried to avoid Leonard’s gaze, but there was no ignoring the smug satisfaction radiating off him from across the table. 

Margaret brought out a fresh carafe of coffee as the rest of the Legends spread out across the dining room. Mick dropped down to sprawl in the chair beside Leonard’s and put his gun on the table as well. Margaret ignored Ray’s hopeful look to pour the first cup into Sara’s mug.

“Always out and about with these scoundrels, and without even a proper coat,” she said. 

“Hey, those are my scoundrels,” Sara said. 

Margaret turned to Mick next, then moved to pour Leonard a cup. “Speaking of coats,” she said, and she gave him a pointed look over her glasses. “If I’d given my overcoat away to every pretty thing that couldn’t handle his horse, I wouldn’t’ve made it here to serve you dinner today.” 

Barry colored, and Leonard met his mortified gaze with a slow smirk across the table. “Look at that face, Margaret.” he said, obviously relishing in the blush climbing Barry’s cheeks. “Can’t expect me to leave him out in the cold.” 

When the food arrived, Barry threw himself into eating to distract himself from the other kind of hunger beginning to creep up his spine. There was more food than even their group could eat, and that was taking into account Barry’s enhanced appetite and Mick’s apparently bottomless stomach. 

The kitchen staff carried out a roast ham and an enormous turkey, heaping bowls of mashed potatoes that glistened with pools of butter, and large pans of root vegetables roasted with aromatic herbs.

Barry wasn’t sure how such a small inn was producing so much food, and that was before dessert was brought out, fresh gingerbread served with mulled wine. Barry accepted a cup of the wine from a server, despite knowing that his metabolism would chase the alcohol out of his system before he could even feel it, and something occurred to him on the first sip.

“Cloves!” he said brightly. The note in Leonard’s cologne he’d been having such a hard time placing—it was cloves. 

“Aye,” the kitchen girl said cautiously. “There are cloves. Have you never had mulled wine before?” 

He caught the tail end of a knowing smirk from Leonard, and Barry glanced up to see the rest of the Legends looking at him curiously. “Uh, no?” he tried. 

The kitchen girl gave him an odd look, then returned to her duties. 

Dinner with the Legends was a warm, raucous affair. They were happy to loop Barry into their conversations, those he hadn’t met before having been impressed by his help with the reindeer, but Barry still found himself missing his own team more than once. Near the end of the meal, he thought about the cookies still waiting in the oven back in his own time, and felt a pang of guilt.

His foot was already all but healed, only a hint of an ache when he tested it beneath the table. It would be hours until he could safely put it under the strain of running at Flash speed, but he was fairly certain he’d be able to walk on it soon. 

The Legends had scattered over the course of dinner, but Barry found his gaze drawn to Leonard repeatedly throughout the night. It was still hard to look at him straight on, too many emotions churning in his chest, but it was also becoming increasingly difficult to look away. 

A quick search of the room showed Leonard leaning backwards against the bar. He was standing beside Sara, head tipped toward her in a way that suggested she was speaking to him, but Barry was too far away to hear them over the conversations of others. 

After a moment, Leonard turned slightly toward her and seemed to say something. Barry didn’t quite catch the movement of his lips, but he gathered it had been something unexpected, as Sara responded by putting her drink down and turning to look at Leonard straight on. 

Leonard kept his gaze across the room, the picture of detachment with his elbows resting on the bar behind him. Sara said something back, and Barry watched Leonard slide his gaze over to her briefly before he replied. 

Sara became the team captain even as Barry watched, straightening on her stool and crossing her arms, with one eyebrow lifted in clear challenge to whatever Leonard had just said. When she spoke, Leonard lifted one shoulder in the barest suggestion of a shrug, and drummed his fingers on the bar as he answered her.

They stared each other down for a long second, and then Sara’s lips pulled up in an incredulous smirk. She shook her head, but she seemed to be laughing as she picked her drink up again. Leonard inclined his head slightly, then pushed off the bar and crossed over to the nearest fireplace to watch Nate trounce Ray at arm wrestling in the atom suit. 

Barry couldn’t help himself from looking back at Sara, wondered with a hint of something he refused to call jealousy if she was watching Leonard too. But he found Sara looking at him over her shoulder instead, and he jumped guiltily when their eyes met. 

Sara gave him an amused grin, and she tipped the neck of her beer toward him in a discrete toast as he blinked back at her, confused. Then she indicated the stool next to her and turned back to the bar. 

“Barry,” she said, once he’d crossed the room to sit beside her. She offered him a handshake that he took gladly. “I didn’t get the chance to thank you for your help earlier. Gideon tells me it’s Christmas Eve in your time, too.”

She spoke to him with the warmth and respect of an equal, despite their difference in age, and Barry found himself straightening up to stand a little taller, eager to represent himself well as the leader of his own team. Her smile was understanding when he did, seeing through him in a moment, and he felt bad for his earlier fit of jealousy. 

“I’m always happy to lend a hand,” he said. “Your team has helped mine out with plenty of worse situations than flying reindeer.”

Sara acknowledged it, spreading her arms in a mock curtsy from the bar stool. A certain amusement was still glittering behind her eyes and lurking in the corner of smile, though, when she asked, “What can I do for you, Barry? Drink? I can get you something stronger than wine.”

“No, thanks,” he said.

She nodded, clearly remembering. “Right, sorry.”

“It’s fine,” he said. “I’d just start singing if I could get drunk. You should be thankful karaoke doesn’t exist yet.”

Sara laughed, and Barry took the chance to ask his question. “I came over to ask about heading back to my time, actually,” he said. “If you don’t expect any more action tonight, would you mind giving me a lift in the Waverider?” 

“Personally, I haven’t ruled out more action just yet,” Sara said, raising a blush on Barry’s cheeks with the wink and playful smile she flashed him. “But actually, no can do tonight.”

Barry was still recovering—so much for coming off as a respectable leader—when the words registered. “Wait, seriously?” he asked. 

“Mm,” Sara confirmed, taking a pull off her beer. “I gave the team the night off. You don’t think we always drink this much, I hope. Why don’t you take the night off too, keep your weight off that foot, and we’ll take you back first thing? 

“I have cookies in the oven,” Barry said, unable to keep the whine out of his voice, and Sara seemed to smile despite herself. 

“Of course you do,” she said, as if to herself. “I’ll get you back in time. Just tell me when. Tomorrow.” 

Barry forced himself to smile back at her, and nodded as he stood up from his seat. He was about to head back to his spot at the table when Mick slammed open the door of the inn and shouted: “Legends, lace up!” 

A gust of snow blew in after him, and someone shouted for him to close the door. Silhouetted as Mick was against the dark street behind him, it took Barry a moment to realize he had half a dozen pair of ice skates dangling from their laces in one large hand. 

Barry took an automatic step backwards. “Uh, my foot,” he said, to no one in particular. “I shouldn’t—” 

“Is it still bothering you?” Sara asked. She looked in surprise at the foot, which Barry realized belatedly he was currently standing on, unsupported.

“I heard that, Flash,” Mick said. “Don’t give me that crap. Leonard’ll lace you up. The rest of you, we hit the ice in ten.”

Barry was surprised to realize that the other Legends seemed mostly amenable to the idea. They began finishing up last bites of food, pushing their chairs away from tables, then stretching and grinning at each other as they stood.

“Team bonding,” Sara said. “It’s a bit of a tradition. Why don’t you join us? I’m sure Margaret could lend you some clothes. Has she mentioned she raised four sons?” 

Barry opened his mouth to answer, then looked down at himself, affronted. “I’m wearing clothes,” he said. 

“You’re wearing a leather bondage suit and a coat,” Sara said. “Trust me, you’re gonna want something warmer.”

Barry spluttered indignantly, but she was already waving Margaret over to them.   
  


* * *

Which was how he ended up clinging to the railing on the edge of a skating rink twenty minutes later, wearing a borrowed shirt and trousers and trying not to resent the other Legends as they swept past him to start a game of pick-up hockey further down the ice.

“Don’t want to pick sides, Barry?” 

Leonard stepped out onto the ice next to him, infuriatingly steady despite the pair of Victorian skates on his feet. 

“You may not have noticed,” Barry said, “but ice? Really isn’t my element.” He tried to move forward a step and nearly slid into a split instead. “At all.”

He heard Leonard’s amused huff and cut him a glare. 

“Do you need your coat back?” he asked. Leonard looked underdressed with only a light jacket and scarf on over his clothes, but he waved Barry’s offer away with a twist of his fingers. 

“Keep it,” he said. Then he dragged his gaze up his body so slowly that Barry could practically feel it on his skin, and he smirked. “Looks good on you.” 

Barry rolled his eyes, unable to keep his pulse from fluttering at Leonard’s familiar flirtations. He was taken aback when Leonard moved closer to him, though, and he didn’t have time to figure out how to take a step back in the skates before Leonard dropped easily to his knees in front of him. 

Barry froze. He must have been hallucinating; surely he’d knocked his head on the ground after being dropped by the reindeer, and this was all a very odd fever dream. Not so much odder than falling off a flying reindeer, he conceded to himself. But still, there was no reason that Leonard would be looking up at him from between his feet, eyes impossibly blue under a fringe of dark lashes, unless— 

Leonard yanked the laces of one of Barry’s skates tight. 

“Good way to break your ankle,” he said, “lacing your skates so loose.” The smirk he tipped Barry was too knowing by half, and he retied the laces with quick, precise movements before moving to the other skate. 

Barry had to swallow hard and avert his gaze across the ice as Leonard tightened his other laces, counting the gas lights around the edge of the rink and trying desperately to keep control of his body’s reaction to having Leonard on his knees in front of him. He felt one of Leonard’s hands skirt up the back of his calf, but when he risked a look down, Leonard was only straightening his trouser leg over the top of the skate. 

When Leonard pushed back to his feet with an easy grace and put a little distance between them with long, lazy backwards drags of his skates, it was easy for Barry to glare at him. 

“So, tell me, Barry,” he said. “How's our dear Central? Lost without me?” 

It surprised a laugh out of Barry. “As if you didn’t know how many fans you had.”

“Thirty-six thousand on Facebook,” Leonard replied. “But who’s counting?” 

Barry shook his head and turned his head away to hide his smile. God, but he’d missed this, the easy give and take between them, the sharp intelligence in Leonard’s eyes and the intoxicating feeling of having his undivided attention. Any immunity he’d once built up to it had dwindled to nothing in the years since Leonard’s death, and it was almost too much to be alone with him now. 

“Not gonna get anywhere if you don’t move your feet,” Leonard reminded him. 

“Where did you learn—” Barry exhaled, frustrated, when just shifting his weight caused one skate to sweep out from under him. He doubled down on his grip on the railing. “You know what? Don’t answer that. I can feel a pun coming on.” 

Leonard lifted an imaginary key to his lips, turned it once, and threw it over his shoulder. Then, predictably, he answered anyway a few minutes later. 

“Lisa.” 

Hs was drifting backwards across the ice, a little in front of Barry, his skates barely leaving the ice as he moved them in slow strokes. 

Barry, meanwhile, was convinced he was somehow getting worse. His fingers were stiff from pulling himself along the wooden rail, and he could tell from Leonard’s expression that he wasn’t so much doing something wrong as he was suffering from a fundamental lack of ability. 

“Lisa taught you to skate?” he asked.

Leonard turned his gaze away with the ghost of a private smile. _"I_ taught _her,"_ he said. “She decides she wanted lessons after hearing about Tonya Harding on the news. Put a framed picture of her on the fridge. That railing is throwing off your balance.”

Barry blinked at the sudden change it topic, then gave the rail a betrayed look. 

Leonard turned, skated a few feet toward the center of the rink, and then faced him again. He raised an expectant eyebrow. 

Barry released his grip finger by finger, then pushed hesitantly away from the edge. He wobbled, but didn’t fall, and he threw Leonard a triumphant grin. 

“So you gave her lessons?” he asked. He edged one foot forward, then the other. “I can’t imagine that.”

“Teaching you, aren’t I? Shoulders back.” 

Barry hadn’t even realized he was stooped over for balance, and he straightened up cautiously. “I’m not sure if this counts as teaching,” he said. “More like, delaying the inevitable.”

“Delay the inevitable long enough,” Leonard said, “it stops being inevitable.” 

Barry threw him a confused look, brow furrowed. “Even you can’t tell me that makes sense,” he said. “Inevitable means—” 

He took an overly ambitious step forward. His skate lurched, sending him reeling, and he only came to a stop when Leonard’s hands closed over the lapels of his borrowed coat. 

Barry blinked up at him, surprised to find him suddenly so close. 

“Inevitable,” Leonard agreed, and then he pressed his lips to Barry’s. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading so far! 
> 
> Chapter 2 is almost ready to roll, so be sure to look out for it in the next few days. Comments are appreciated in the meantime—I'd love to hear what you guys are enjoying so far!


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